George Foreman was a man of faith, a businessman and, above all, an outstanding boxer. He was an American boxer with a devastating uppercut, a large man (1.92 meters/6 feet 4 inches) renowned for his superhuman strength, which enabled him to dominate the rings for several decades, until the mid-1990s. For his family, he was also “a force for good, a man of discipline and conviction,” they wrote in the statement announcing his death, on Friday, March 21, at the age of 76, in Houston (Texas).
The legend of “Big George” was born one day in October 1968 when, a complete unknown at the age of 19, he won the gold medal in the heavyweight category at the Olympic Games in Mexico City. As he came close to retirement, in April 1995, he agreed to open his memory box for Le Monde and look back on those early days: “I was a punk, a bad boy. I got into the ring to kill my opponent. Hatred was in my body, in my muscles, behind every punch I threw.”
Foreman’s early life was marked by a difficult childhood, which began with his birth on January 10, 1949, in an underprivileged black neighborhood in Houston. After dropping out of school at the age of 15, he tried his hand at bricklaying and carpentry before finding his calling for the first time: “I think nature made me a boxer. It’s in me. I was born to get in the ring. Already a national and Olympic champion, he conquered the world title on January 22, 1973, in Kingston, Jamaica, in a memorable bout.
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